By Dave Anderson:
Ahh, the joys of elected judgeships, as chronicled by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:
Even though current recipients ages 50 to 60 would be grandfathered in, the change drew the ire of Councilman Jim Motznik. The council veteran, who won a May primary election to become a district judge, repeatedly opposed any move to bring the city into line with state law if it made 50- to 59-year-olds ineligible.
"So it's not in compliance with state law. Big deal," he said. "I don't give a damn if [the tax break] is illegal or unconstitutional if it supports the poor people of the city of Pittsburgh."
Where is my rusty nail to drive through my skull?
This fight is over a combination of good governance, taxes, and the state's uniform taxation clause. The City Council is trying to streamline a tax break for seniors. Currently, senior homeowners must re-apply for the tax break every year, and unsurprisingly, quite a few people who are less connected fall through the cracks. The city legal department thinks the current city defintion of "senior citizen" violates the state constitution, and the solution is to change the law for incoming non-seniors to not receive the tax break. The problem is that seniors and almost seniors who are impacted by the proposed change are the overwhelming proportion of the Democratic primary electorate. So we have a guy who has a 99.8% chance of being a state judge saying "So it's not in compliance with state law, big deal...."
No comments:
Post a Comment